The other day I kept hearing this noise from my neighbor. I couldn’t quite figure
it out, and naturally it was annoying. I didn’t do anything about it, but it
got me thinking about some random facts about sound and noise.

Sound travels a smidge less than 1 foot per second at standard temperature and pressure.
Therefore if you need to place speakers in front of other speakers, you need to delay
them based on distance… 40 feet = ~40ms of delay.

If a speaker is placed in front of another without a delay, the sound from the speaker
farthest from you will sound similar to an echo. This is called the Haas effect.
However, most people don’t notice this until there is a 40ms gap between sounds, or
roughly 40 feet. After about 40ms of delay, the intelligibility of the sound
also decreases. I.e. it starts to degrade the quality, and you start having
trouble understanding what you hear.

At first glance the obvious answer is no, of course not. However, if we took
away the practical aspects of both, things might be a little different. Think
about it…

In medicine there is a standard of care: keep the person alive and healthy.
This is done through years of study, years of practice, not to mention the constant
need to keep up on latest drugs and treatments. There is however one constant.

The body, in all it’s natural wonders, only really has one specification. One
heart, two lungs, two kidneys, one liver, one stomach, one brain, etc.

Software development on the other hand, does not have one specification. Arguably,
there is no specification.

Software Development: Be able to develop anything and everything.

It’s an interesting concept. There are similarities between the jobs (as well
as between a lot of other jobs too) because both need to keep up on latest practices,
abide by rules, procedures, policies, and laws, all the while doing it well.

Developers, however, do not have the luxury of being able to follow a single set of
standards though. In our world, the righteous developers don’t just stick to
one platform or one language. You aren’t a true developer if you only know one
language, or can only code on one platform.

You aren’t a doctor if you can only save human lives. Wait. No.
That’s not right.

We are considered uninformed if we stick to one platform.

Practically speaking, being a doctor is without a doubt much harder than being a developer.
There are days though that I wish I were a doctor so I didn’t have to listen to other
developers complain about platforms or languages or methodologies or…

My point being: stop telling me that your way is better. I don’t care.
I really, really don’t. I will use what feels natural to me.

While I am definitely not looking for a new job, I was bored and thought I would take
a stab at a stylized resume to see if I could hone some of my (lack of) graphics skills.
It didn’t turn out too badly, but I am certainly no graphics designer.

Have you ever been using the output window in Visual Studio, scrolled up, and then
lost the auto-scroll functionality? It’s really annoying when you have a thousand
things coming out through the likes of Debug.Write, or even if it’s just a massive
build.

To re-enable autoscrolling, while in the output window just hit CTRL+END.

While I was in California last week I decided to visit the new Microsoft Store in
Mission Viejo. While there, the managers graciously allowed me to take pictures
of the store. Frankly, they probably thought it was a little creepy. But
nevertheless, they said go for it, and I did.

Now, Microsoft did one hell of a job making it known that the store existed while
I was at the mall. While I was grabbing coffee in the food court, these stickers
were on each table:

Following that, as you head towards the store you see two large LCD screens in the
centre of the walkway. On one side you have a Rock Band - Beatles installation
running XBox 360 over HD.

On the other side was a promotional video.

Microsoft designed their store quite well. Large floor to ceiling windows for
the storefront, with an inviting light wood flooring to create a very warm atmosphere.
While there were hundreds of people in the store, it was very welcoming.

Along the three walls (because the 4th is glass) is a breathtaking video panorama.
I’m not quite sure how to really describe it. It’s as if the entire wall was
a single display, running in full HD.

In the center of the store is a collection of laptops and assorted electronics like
the Zune’s. There’s probably a logical layout, perhaps by price, or performance.
I wasn’t paying too much attention to that unfortunately.

At the center-back of the store is Microsoft’s Answers desk. Much like the Apple
Genius Bar, except not so arrogant. Yes, I said it. Ironically, the display
for customer names looked very iPod-ish here, and in the Apple Store, the equivalent
display looked like XP Media Center. Go figure.

One of the things I couldn’t quite believe was the XBox 360 being displayed overlay
the video panorama video. The video engine for that must have been extremely
powerful. That had to be a 1080P display for the XBox. As a developer,
I was astonished (and wondered where I could get that app!) A few of the employee’s
mentioned that it was driven by Windows 7. Pretty freakin’ sweet.

Also in the store were a couple Surfaces! This was the first time I actually
had the opportunity to play with one. They are pretty cool.

And that in a few pictures was my trip to the Microsoft store. There was also
a couple pamphlets in store describing training sessions and schedules for quick how-to’s
in Windows 7 that I walked away with.

The other day while I was sitting in the airport in Washington, D.C., I had a random
thought. When the ZuneHD first hit the shelves people were talking about how
Mobile 7 might borrow the look and feel. It’s sleek, easy to use/easy to understand,
and is very simple. So I started thinking about what such an interface might
look like. This is something I did quickly. Nothing was provided by Microsoft.
Nobody has said anything about Mobile 7 design (at least, not at that point, but
nobody cared anyway). This is simply something I thought the interface might
look like.

Some things to notice are the list-like menu’s, and the bing search
at the bottom. Blah-blah-blah anti-trust, the point is search is easily accessible,
not necessarily just to Microsoft’s own search engine. It could be Google’s
search too. Also, there is the location-specific information at the top showing
the current weather. Also mimicking the Windows 7 interface is the idea of pinning
things to the home screen such as the Internet Explorer application.

There are some things that should probably change. It feels a little cluttered
at the bottom showing current messages and the appointments color is iffy. There
may not be any need for the middle separation either.

Got this list in an email earlier today. Not sure the original source, as it
was a copy/paste job, but holy crap what a list. If someone can point out where
it originated I will attribute it as necessary.

Ease of Access keyboard shortcuts

Right Shift for eight seconds: Turn Filter Keys on and off

Left Alt + Left Shift + PrtScn (or PrtScn): Turn High Contrast on or off

Left Alt + Left Shift + Num Lock: Turn Mouse Keys on or off

Shift five times: Turn Sticky Keys on or off

Num Lock for five seconds: Turn Toggle Keys on or off

Windows logo key + U: Open the Ease of Access Center

General keyboard shortcuts

F1: Display Help

Ctrl + C (or Ctrl + Insert): Copy the selected item

Ctrl + X: Cut the selected item

Ctrl + V (or Shift + Insert): Paste the selected item

Ctrl + Z: Undo an action

Ctrl + Y: Redo an action

Delete (or Ctrl + D): Delete the selected item and move it to the Recycle Bin

Shift + Delete: Delete the selected item without moving it to the Recycle Bin first

F2: Rename the selected item

Ctrl + Right Arrow: Move the cursor to the beginning of the next word

Ctrl + Left Arrow: Move the cursor to the beginning of the previous word

Ctrl + Down Arrow: Move the cursor to the beginning of the next paragraph

Ctrl + Up Arrow: Move the cursor to the beginning of the previous paragraph

Ctrl + Shift with an arrow key: Select a block of text

Shift + any arrow key: Select more than one item in a window or on the desktop, or
select text within a document

Ctrl + any arrow key + Spacebar: Select multiple individual items in a window or on
the desktop

Ctrl + A: Select all items in a document or window

F3: Search for a file or folder

Alt + Enter: Display properties for the selected item

Alt + F4: Close the active item, or exit the active program

Alt + Spacebar: Open the shortcut menu for the active window

Ctrl + F4: Close the active document (in programs that allow you to have multiple
documents open simultaneously)

Alt + Tab: Switch between open items

Ctrl + Alt + Tab: Use the arrow keys to switch between open items

Ctrl + Mouse scroll wheel: Change the size of icons on the desktop

Windows logo key + Tab: Cycle through programs on the taskbar by using Aero Flip 3-D

Ctrl+ Windows logo key + Tab: Use the arrow keys to cycle through programs on the
taskbar by using Aero Flip 3-D

Shift + Click on a taskbar button: Open a program or quickly open another instance
of a program

Ctrl + Shift + Click on a taskbar button: Open a program as an administrator

Shift + Right-click on a taskbar button: Show the window menu for the program

Shift + Right-click on a grouped taskbar button: Show the window menu for the group

Ctrl + Click on a grouped taskbar button: Cycle through the windows of the group

Magnifier keyboard shortcuts

Windows logo key + Plus Sign or Minus Sign: Zoom in or out

Ctrl + Alt + Spacebar: Preview the desktop in full-screen mode

Ctrl + Alt + F: Switch to full-screen mode

Ctrl + Alt + L: Switch to lens mode

Ctrl + Alt + D: Switch to docked mode

Ctrl + Alt + I: Invert colors

Ctrl + Alt + arrow keys: Pan in the direction of the arrow keys

Ctrl + Alt + R: Resize the lens

Windows logo key + Esc: Exit Magnifier

Remote Desktop Connection keyboard shortcuts

Alt + Page Up: Move between programs from left to right.

Alt + Page Down: Move between programs from right to left.

Alt + Insert: Cycle through programs in the order that they were started in.

Alt + Home: Display the Start menu.

Ctrl + Alt + Break: Switch between a window and full screen.

Ctrl + Alt + End: Display the Windows Security dialog box.

Alt + Delete: Display the system menu.

Ctrl + Alt + Minus Sign (-) on the numeric keypad: Place a copy of the active window,
within the client, on the Terminal server clipboard (provides the same functionality
as pressing Alt + PrtScn on a local computer).

Ctrl + Alt + Plus Sign (+) on the numeric keypad: Place a copy of the entire client
window area on the Terminal server clipboard (provides the same functionality as pressing
PrtScn on a local computer).

Ctrl + Alt + Right Arrow: Tab out of the Remote Desktop controls to a control in the
host program (for example, a button or a text box). Useful when the Remote Desktop
controls are embedded in another (host) program.

Ctrl + Alt + Left Arrow: Tab out of the Remote Desktop controls to a control in the
host program (for example, a button or a text box). Useful when the Remote Desktop
controls are embedded in another (host) program.

Paint keyboard shortcuts

Ctrl + N: Create a new picture

Ctrl + O: Open an existing picture

Ctrl + S: Save changes to a picture

F12: Save the picture as a new file

Ctrl + P: Print a picture

Alt + F4: Close a picture and its Paint window

Ctrl + Z: Undo a change

Ctrl + Y: Redo a change

Ctrl + A: Select the entire picture

Ctrl + X: Cut a selection

Ctrl + C: Copy a selection to the Clipboard

Ctrl + V: Paste a selection from the Clipboard

Right Arrow: Move the selection or active shape right by one pixel

Left Arrow: Move the selection or active shape left by one pixel

Down Arrow: Move the selection or active shape down by one pixel

Up Arrow: Move the selection or active shape up by one pixel

Esc: Cancel a selection

Delete: Delete a selection

Ctrl + B: Bold selected text

Ctrl + +: Increase the width of a brush, line, or shape outline by one pixel

Ctrl + -: Decrease the width of a brush, line, or shape outline by one pixel